23 August 2009

There are those who would equate internet piracy with stealing. To do
this is in essence correct, but it ignores a large grey area which I
think must be addressed.

First, I want to point out that I in no way am an advocate of large
scale piracy - ripping DVD's or CD's right after release or even weeks
before, and then turning around and disseminating the content for your
own monetary gain. This is arguably just plain wrong.

Instead, what I'll be talking about is the average person who shares
music, who downloads a TV show because they can't get it in their
country, or because it is no longer available on the air, or even on
disc, or who mods their console to play different region games. This is
the sort of 'piracy' I'm talking about.

Now we need to get another thing straight. I'm not going to go into OED
definitions of stealing and piracy. I'm going to do something that is
usually forbidden by my own rules, and redefine the terms for the
purpose of this discussion. I feel the need to do so because the world
is changing, and traditional concepts of theft just don't hold.

There are two ways to steal. One is to take something in such a way so
that the original owner doesn't have access to it anymore. If I stole
your car, this would be an example of what I'm talking about. You'd
have to buy a new car, or walk to work. That would suck, and I should
be duly punished for such a crime.

Way number two is to take something in such a way so that the original
owner maintains access to the article, but is still sometimes
inconvenienced as a result. If I were to somehow build an exact
duplicate of your car, complete with the custom paint job, and drive
around town, perhaps going to seedy places, and people mistook me for
you due to the similarity of our vehicles, this would be an example.
You'd be inconvenienced, but I wouldn't have technically stolen the
car. I might have negatively impacted your life, and that would suck.
But most would agree that any such punishment I would incur, if any,
should be of a lesser magnitude than if I had actually driven away your
real car while laughing maniacally.

This is pretty much a thought experiment. No one is going to build a
duplicate of your car. For centuries, no one had to worry about this
distinction. Taking food, or money, or tools from someone was theft,
plain and simple.

Today, with the advent of digital transference of data, this sort of
thing is now possible. If you make a song, a story, or even a whole
movie, everyone in the world can take it from you, while leaving the
original unchanged. They are no longer taking anything from you at all.

Or are they? If you make your living by charging people to see your bit
of art, and someone else copies it and puts it up for display, you lose
your income. They aren't just stealing a thing, they're
stealing your livelihood. To add insult to injury, they usually make a
buck off it, too.

This is unacceptable, of course. But the reality is that it's still not
that simple. Whereas in the good old days, when someone took something
from you, the loss was obvious and apparent. 'A thief stole my wallet.
Thus, I am short one wallet.' But with this new method of theft, your
loss is less salient, and must be calculated. And this is where it all
falls apart. They aren't stealing anything from you that currently
exists, but something that would have, or more likely, just might have, existed
- i.e. future profit, or sales.

Let me make this very clear. No longer is it true theft, but simply an
action that cuts into your future profit. The act must then be punished
accordingly. Why? Because someone who cuts into profits must be
punished. Right?

Well, if that's true, let's examine the situation to see what else
might cut into profits. Let's take a movie, for example. What sort of
things might also cause a movie to not make as much money as expected?

It might suck.

There might be a popular video game released on the opening
weekend.

There might be, oh I don't know, swine flu. Or a bad
economy.

The theatre might not be well situated, or air-conditioned.

The film may not have been advertised sufficiently, or well.

A critic at an early screening may have hated it, and said
so.

The film may have content that prevents certain groups,
such as minors, or Christians, from seeing it.

Another film may be competing with it, sucking up the
moviegoers.

Or, somebody may have put it up on a torrent site.

We now see that this so-called 'piracy' is just one more factor in a
long list of things that cuts into a film's financial success. It's not
theft, it's just a nuisance. It may be the straw that broke the camel's
back, and it might be easily punishable. For instance, it can be traced
to one zitfaced teenager with a camera in the audience, who is easily
blamed. Who do you blame when your movie sucks? But isn't it just as
easy to trace a film's failure (or lack of projected success) to a
single critic? Do critics get gaoled or fined for cutting into profits?
No, they're payed for it. I suppose they alway have the capability of
increasing profits for some other lucky movie. But doesn't piracy have
that capacity, as well? Raising people's attention to the existence of
the film?

I guess what I'm trying to say is that no major media corporation has
been utterly obliterated by piracy as of yet. They post losses, they
make wild calculations about what might have been, and they whine, and
they want to hold someone responsible. Hey, I'd like it if I could take
people to court for not paying me money to watch my antics, too, but
it's not gonna happen.

Ultimately, piracy cuts into profits. Just like competition. And
America thrives (or is supposed to thrive) on competition. When you
start losing money to the other guy, step up your game. Think of piracy
like the other guy - like competition. When piracy cuts into sales, and
you start losing money - step up your game. Should theatres have killed
TV? Should cable have killed VHS? No, and moreover, they didn't. And
media corporations shouldn't - and I think, won't - kill piracy. The
smart thing to do is to compete. No back-stabbing, no throat-cutting.
If you don't want people to pirate, make them not want to pirate. I
can't download the IMAX experience. I can't e-mail myself to a concert.
I can't print out a limited edition Master Chief figurine. Maybe
someday we'll be able to, and then the corporations will have to step
up their game once again. That's what they do, that's how they survive.
But we'll continue to cause friction, trying to bring them down. Cos
we're weasels, and that's what we do.

Stop gouging the little guy. Stop threatening teenagers with gaol time who just want
to play foreign games. Stop denying the average citisen
a well-rounded cultural education just because you want a buck for
every song they'll ever hear.

And, for the love of all that's good, stop whining and looking around
wildly for someone to blame when your movie doesn't make as many
millions of dollars as your over-eager marketing department thought it
would.